Last week Intel recently updated its specifications for the 7th generation processors. In doing so, we can see several new Kaby Lake i3 SKUs coming to desktop, along with a few new KBL-U series SoCs for notebooks and a new Xeon E3-1285 v6 CPU, which matches the specification for Apples newest iMac. The full specification update from Intel is listed here.

New Desktop Core i3 Kaby Lake CPUs

The existing lineup of Core i3 on the desktop has six models ranging from the i3-7100T to the Core i3-7350K. Like previous generations, all the parts have two cores and support hyperthreading, although Intel did shake things up with this generation by offering an overclockable Core i3, but also moving the lower-class Pentiums from plain dual core to dual-core with HT as competition. The main differences between the parts are core frequency (Core i3 has no Turbo), L3 cache, GPU Turbo and TDP.

7th Generation Core i3 and Pentium Desktop Processors

Stepping

Cores

Freq

L3

GPU Turbo
Frequency

TDP

List
Price

Core i3-7350K

B-0

2 / 4

4.2 GHz

4 MB

1150 MHz

60W

$168

Core i3-7340

S-0

2 / 4

4.2 GHz

4 MB

1150 MHz

51W

*new

Core i3-7320

B-0

2 / 4

4.1 GHz

4 MB

1150 MHz

51W

$149

Core i3-7320T

S-0

2 / 4

3.6 GHz

4 MB

1100 MHz

35W

*new

Core i3-7300

B-0

2 / 4

4.0 GHz

4 MB

1100 MHz

54W

$138

Core i3-7300T

B-0

2 / 4

3.5 GHz

4 MB

1100 MHz

35W

$138

Core i3-7120

S-0

2 / 4

4.0 GHz

3 MB

1100 MHz

51W

*new

Core i3-7120T

S-0

2 / 4

3.5 GHz

3 MB

1100 MHz

35W

*new

Core i3-7100

B-0

2 / 4

3.9 GHz

3 MB

1100 MHz

51W

$117

Core i3-7100T

B-0

2 / 4

3.4 GHz

3 MB

1100 MHz

35W

$117

Pentium G4620

B-0

2 / 4

3.7 GHz

3 MB

1100 MHz

51W

$86

Pentium G4600

B-0

2 / 4

3.6 GHz

3 MB

1100 MHz

51W

$64

Pentium G4560

B-0

2 / 4

3.5 GHz

3 MB

1050 MHz

54W

$52

According to the updated document, the new CPUs are the Core i3-7120, Core i3-7120T, Core i3-7320T, and the i3-7340. These parts do not have prices listed but are labeled as a new 'S-0' stepping compared to the previous B-0 stepping parts. Aside from this, they are either lower power parts (the T CPUs) or small MHz bumps.

New Laptop Kaby Lake-U 15W CPUs

Aside from the Desktop i3 parts, Intel is filling out some of the mobile SoCs as well. Intel's 15W line is commonly used in fast but thin notebooks, but typically needs an active fan to keep cool (unless you have a Huawei Matebook X). Intel uses its 15W moniker for Core i3, Core i5-U and Core i7-U parts, which are all dual-core with hyperthreading, but differ in base frequency, turbo frequency, L3 cache and GPU frequencies.

Additional (7/17): We've been told by Intel that these SKUs were mistakenly added to the datasheet in question, and are not finalized for release (if they will be released at all). Specifically, we were told:

The SKUs listed are not intended to be in the market anytime soon. A couple of them will actually never become products.

Additional (7/17): These SKUs were removed at the request of Intel, as they will not be coming to market (and they've apparently already had requests from customers, it seems). We've requested that Intel shares with us info with us if new U SKUs are planned to come to market in the future.

New Intel E3-1200 v6 Series Xeon: The New iMac CPU?

When Intel launched the E3-1200 series, we commented that the last CPU in the stack pushed the boundaries for price: The E3-1280 v6 was $612, and only a small bump in frequency over the E3-1275 v6. Now Intel is set to launch the E3-1285 v6, which again bumps up the frequency - becoming a mix of the top Core i7 parts.

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52 Comments

Underclocking ryzen has revealed that the initial production revision drops to about 60 watts at 3 Ghz. That puts it at 7.5 watts per core. A dual core would therefore use about 15 watts of power, leaving a whole another 20 watts for an iGPU to make it to 35 watts.

And this is "desktop grade" ryzen, chips tailored for mobiles will inevitably be even more efficient. Also ryen at 3Ghz will likely beat i3 at 3.5 Ghz in single threaded performance, and it also benefits more from "hyperthreading".

Although I am not certain how much of the iGPU is actually included in the i3 TDP. AVX torture tests have revealed the 35 watts i3 to go all the way to 30 watts, and that's on the CPU alone, without even loading the GPU with heavy graphics. I'd say the GPU is actually somewhere between 10-15 watts, which would bring the average CPU core power usage to 17.5 to 15 watts, which is at least twice as high as "desktop ryzen" cores at comparable performance level.Reply

With ryzen having a lower IPC (it is slower clock for clock) how on earth would it be faster at a lower frequency? Intel still rules single threaded performance. Ryzen quadcores would beat the i3 in multi thread scenarios and lose in single thread. For most consumers it would probably mean browsing is a bit slower and encoding mp3 is faster.

Dual-core vs dual-core AMD would lose on every level to an i3...

Also it is no surprise the 35w i3 can use 30 watt for the CPU alone. Why not use the headroom you have? When graphics are loaded up the CPU will probably clock down to leave room for more GPU.Reply

Coffee Lake is not a top-to-bottom SKU spread. These Kaby Lake Refresh parts, particularly the 15W parts, will not ever see a Coffee Lake replacement. They will move directly to Cannon Lake instead.Reply

@NewMaxx those start shipping in August as far as we know@Cygni - that's not what Intel has hinted at in recent weeks. They did claim a 30% or so perf gain at 15W with a quad core vs current duals and as far as we know those are arriving very soon.Reply

Actually there's some doubt whether 6-core Coffe Lake i7 will really ship in Q3, since Z370 is rumored to be postponed to Q4 (source: some mainboard manufacturer via twitter) and it's not clear whether they'll run on Z270, despite using the same socket. Anything less is scheduled for H1 2018 as far as I have read.Reply

You're paying a bit less than $100 more (than the comparable Pentium) for what, AVX256? I think they also finally disabled ECC in i3 (it was disabled much earlier in i5 and i7, I've always assumed this was to keep an "ARM server-killer" on the price list to prevent any such competition).

I'd have a hard time arguing that the extra .5-1 GHz (especially with the 7350K option) isn't such a bad idea when looking for the price of the entire *system*, but at that point you have to ask yourself about the Ryzen R5.

I'd recommend either a Pentium G46*0 or R5. The patch in between costs a lot for very little additional power. Of course if your critical application already uses AVX256, by all means by an i3 (or i5, if you have that level of parallelism, i5 may well max things out).Reply